"Contemporary
Forgeries"

These coins were unofficial copies and were often made to look like
well worn currency as their intention was to pass as legal currency.

They
were also shipped to America in substantial quantities to be used during a period when
there was a shortage of home-grown coinage (pre 1790).

WG-5310:1691 William & Mary
Tin Halfpenny.An interesting, high
grade contemporary counterfeit!This
would easily have passed as the real thing in the 1690’s and even today amongst
some dealers & collectors.However,
it is a cast and as such there is no edge legend.The brass plug is obviously not brass on this
coin.Reported to be a River Thames find
from the 1970’s which would account for the high state of preservation.£235

WG-5729:1790’s George III Copper
Halfpenny “Evasion” – Alfred The Great.Obverse depicting a representation of Alfred
the Great; reverse with a variation on the usual Britannia but seeming to
include aspects of the Irish halfpenny reverse (harp), presumably to cover all
bases.Atkins 2.These pieces are many in variety and are all
unofficial.Counterfeiting was rife
during the last years of the eighteenth century as the last Royal Mint small
change issue was 1775.Most of the
coppers in circulation at that time were counterfeits – genuine coins at 10g or
more melted down for their copper, mixed with cheaper metals and then made into
fresh, underweight coins (as little as 4g) using crude, home-made dies.You could get four or more counterfeit
coppers out of one genuine copper so the financial benefits were obvious.However, this practise was very much against
the law.Enterprising counterfeiters
circumnavigated the law by doing exactly as they had been doing but instead of
reproducing the official dies, they changed them to basically fantasy dies.The general public were on the whole
illiterate (especially the class of people who would handle such denominations)
so they wouldn’t notice and the government could not prosecute the
counterfeiters (should they ever catch them) because they were not imitating the
official, Regal coinage.The
counterfeiters had one more trick up their sleeve in order to dupe the public
and that was to artificially age these coppers.Don’t forget that there had been no fresh official coppers released from
the mint in over 20 years so all official coinage would be worn, dark and
grimy.The counterfeiters made their
coins look equally as poor by employing a variety of methods including filing
them down, boiling them in oil, making dies that had much wear built into them
and even putting them in stables for a few months where the horse shoes would
scratch / flatten and the horse dung and urine would corrode the coins.This coin is an exceptional example,
seemingly having bypassed the final “aging” stage in the process.£95